It's A Miracle: Stuttgart's Green Mayor Praises Porsche

Bertel Schmitt
by Bertel Schmitt

Shaved head: Works council chief Uwe Hück. Needs new suit: Mayor Fritz Kuhn. Regulation Volkswagen white hair: Porsche CEO Matthias Müller

One would think that a card carrying environmentalist visits Porsche’s plant in Zuffenhausen only for picketing purposes, or as a target for bags with paint or worse. Today, Porsche was visited by a card-carrying environmentalist, and by Stuttgart’s mayor. The two are the same. The usually deeply conservative Stuttgart, home of Daimler and Porsche, elected Fritz Kuhn, member of the Green Party, as its mayor. Mainly because the other candidate Sebastian Turner was a disaster, along with being an adman who is not without criticism in his own ranks. But I digress. Anyway, His Green Honor was at Porsche today.

Porsche proudly notes that Kuhn came by to visit Porsche “only 11 days after inauguration.” He was probably expected with trepidation. When the Green politician Jürgen Trittin came to visit Volkswagen back when Trittin was Federal Minister of the Environment, everybody was very nervous. I know, I had to write the welcome speech, and it was changed many times. I didn’t mind, changes cost money.

Kuhn was at his best behavior today. He praised Porsche as a great employer, and he signaled that as “mayor of an automotive city, I am very interested in close cooperation.” Phew. He also praised the great progress Porsche made in environmental matters, the lowering of CO2, and a new environmentally responsible paint line. If he goes on like that, Greenpeace will picket the green mayor.

P.S.: Kuhn’s official car is a lowly E-Klasse, a hybrid of course.

Bertel Schmitt
Bertel Schmitt

Bertel Schmitt comes back to journalism after taking a 35 year break in advertising and marketing. He ran and owned advertising agencies in Duesseldorf, Germany, and New York City. Volkswagen A.G. was Bertel's most important corporate account. Schmitt's advertising and marketing career touched many corners of the industry with a special focus on automotive products and services. Since 2004, he lives in Japan and China with his wife <a href="http://www.tomokoandbertel.com"> Tomoko </a>. Bertel Schmitt is a founding board member of the <a href="http://www.offshoresuperseries.com"> Offshore Super Series </a>, an American offshore powerboat racing organization. He is co-owner of the racing team Typhoon.

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  • Blowfish Blowfish on Jan 18, 2013

    unless he wanted a good time but not long time, in reality we can't go head on with mullas, industries, bankers and lastly the haves. should he marched to a different beat he could meet the same fate as what happened to Iacocca where his office table was consisted of a wood crates and pallets and the high back chair was ergonomically designed and lumbar supports courtesy of apple box from Washington states. I am sure he's not so green that he wanted to go everywhere on a real Oxcart instead of a car with Ox emblem. In this case if he plays the cards right his new wheels could have a Horse insignia on it. Something the Porsche has.

  • E46M3_333 E46M3_333 on Jan 18, 2013

    Credit to the Germans for not committing economic suicide by regulating their factories out of existence.

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    • Tresmonos Tresmonos on Jan 18, 2013

      @icemilkcoffee Their factories / salary work force are mostly still in place due to insanely-expensive-to-divorce work committees (unions). Global companies will keep the German lights on in their EU plants unless they want to withdraw from the EU altogether. Why do you think Cologne didn't get touched when Ford is shuttering their Belgium operations?

  • Golden2husky Golden2husky on Jan 18, 2013

    Why such a surprise? Giving a damn about our planet and loving cars are not mutually exclusive...I'm living proof. There are a lot of things that count besides absolute fuel efficiency. Clean factories, recycling "waste" from factories, designing for end of life reprocessing all come into play. The idea that most environmentally responsible people want to see the world on a Schwinn is nonsense.

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    • -Cole- -Cole- on Jan 19, 2013

      @shaker It's changing.

  • Lorenzo Lorenzo on Jan 18, 2013

    What I want to know is, what's with the VW execs with white hair? Some of them look much too youthful to be snowtops, much younger than me. I've heard that the one result of being hit by lightning and surviving that's universal is that within 6 months, no matter the age, the person's hair turns white as snow. Is there some kind of, um, process required to be a VW exec?

    • See 1 previous
    • Lorenzo Lorenzo on Jan 19, 2013

      @-Cole- Okay, but HOW do youngish-looking guys get the snow-white topping? As Bertel pointed out, it's a regulation 'do for VW execs, but I hesitate to compare it to the finger amputation popular with Japanese crime syndicates. Could the "treatment" required be part of the reason Bertel parted ways with VW?

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